Asteroid Bennu Yields Sugars, Ancient Stardust, Bolstering Life-Origin Theories
TUCSON, AZ – December 3, 2025 – NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission has delivered a cosmic jackpot: scientists have discovered ribose and glucose – sugars essential to life – within samples retrieved from asteroid Bennu. This marks the first time glucose has been identified in an extraterrestrial sample, alongside previously detected nucleobases and phosphates, confirming the presence of all the building blocks of RNA on the asteroid.The findings, published in Nature and announced today, suggest asteroids like Bennu may have seeded Earth – and potentially other worlds – with the basic components for life.
The finding isn’t just about sugars. Analyses also reveal a surprising abundance of dust originating from supernovae – stars that exploded before our solar system even formed. This ancient stardust, coupled with the organic molecules, paints a picture of Bennu as a time capsule preserving materials from the early universe, offering unprecedented insight into the conditions that may have given rise to life. The presence of ribose, but not deoxyribose, further supports the theory that RNA, not DNA, was the primary genetic material in early life forms.
Led by Ann Nguyen at NASA, the investigation confirms that Bennu harbors materials older than our Sun. “While this may no longer be directly related to the ‘ingredients for life,’ it suggests that Bennu is harbored by particles older than the Sun and may hold the key to understanding the composition of the early universe,” Nguyen stated.
The asteroid samples,collected in 2020 and returned to Earth in September 2023,are undergoing extensive analysis. Scientists believe Bennu’s carbon-rich composition and its location in the inner solar system during Earth’s early history made it a likely delivery vehicle for these crucial compounds.The finding strengthens the hypothesis that asteroids played a pivotal role in delivering the raw materials necessary for life to emerge on our planet, and potentially elsewhere in the solar system.
